The festive season is fast approaching. Many educators will be planning to pause their marketing campaigns. After all, the year is winding down and holiday gatherings and festivities will soon be in full swing. Why blow your money on campaigns when learners will not be in the right mindset to engage and learn?
Wrong! Just because the festive season is around the corner doesn’t mean learning stops. You shouldn’t slack. If anything, the festive season gives you the perfect opportunity to be creative and rope in prospects before the New Year rush begins. According to LinkedIn, advertising in the last months of the year leads to a 25 percent increase in lead-to-enrollment rates compared to the rest of the year.
In this guide, we’ll look at how educators can carry out effective marketing campaigns during the festive season.
Tips For Festive Season Promotion
During the Christmas period, many people invest in self-development and coaching forums. Giving people a course that could help them secure their future is the best Christmas gift you could give them.
As an educator, this is your chance to promote your learning courses and materials. Going silent during the festive season could cost you quality leads and put you in the backfoot against your competitors.
These tips can help you to carry out effective festive season marketing campaigns:
1. Introduce special holiday course bundles
Why sell one course when you can sell two or more? You can leverage holiday bundles during high-shopping seasons such as the festive season to increase your return on investment (ROI). Simply create a bundle of courses at a discounted price instead of selling individual courses. Students will grab up the opportunity to get multiple courses at reduced prices and save time.
2. Give offers
There are a number of offers you can also give to entice festive season shoppers. These include:
Special offers: Special holiday offers can work well for buyers who are on the lookout for yearly promotional discounts. Besides Black Friday offers, December is the best month to go big on sales and increase your ROI. For example, a free bonus course or reduced prices for an existing course can help to attract new students.
Limited-time coupons: Limited-time coupon codes that offer discounts to buyers can add value to course subscriptions. You can also offer coupons for e-learning materials such as e-books, consultation calls, one-on-one or group video coaching, and access to exclusive online communities among others.
Physical presents: While everything is going digital, physical presents are still a hit among many people. In the UK, 63 percent of people under the age of 44 still buy physical books. You can offer these to buyers who want physical copies when they make an online purchase. The present should be relevant to their courses or subjects.
For example, you can offer gardening journals, fruit stamps, garden aprons, or a gardening tool set to people who take up gardening courses.
3. Try gift cards
Christmas is the season of love and gifts, so why not give out some yourself? You can have gift cards for your customers to gift their loved ones something educational. It will go a long way in customer retention and attracting new prospects.
In case you’re afraid that people won’t take up your gift card offers, just remember that holiday shoppers spend about 35 percent of their holiday gifting budget on gift cards. Gift cards are among the most requested gifts during the festive season for a reason.
4. Take part in community events
Fourth, you can sponsor local events or promote a charity in your community during the festive season. This will benefit the community while helping you to build brand awareness. Eighty-one percent of millennials would patronize brands with good corporate citizenship. If you take part in charities or events that the community cares about, they will support your business in return.
5. Embrace social media marketing
Social media marketing should also be a key component of your marketing strategy. Platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter can be great for letting consumers know you’re running festive season offers and discounts. You can then direct them to your landing page.
Additionally, you can create social media communities and forums to give your followers exclusive access to course topics, discussions, or festive season events.
6. Create a Christmas-Themed Webinar
If you offer step-by-step guides and tutorials on DIY crafts, food, or catering services, then a webinar would work great for you. Hospitality and retail sector-related courses would be perfect for this. Ensure that you make the webinar relevant to the Christmas season.
For example, video presentations can focus on holiday-specific subjects and give out specialized advice at no cost. Impactful videos that enable your audiences to keep learning will help to increase brand engagement.
7. Have an influencer or affiliate marketing program
Influencer marketing has proven to be an effective way of attracting and retaining new customers. Celebrity endorsements or product placements can go a long way in helping your brand and products to reach new audiences. You can also use social media micro-influencers for your marketing campaigns.
Alternatively, you can consider affiliate marketing. It’s equally effective in attracting customers. You can create custom-made Christmas deal content for your most active learners on your platform and give them incentives for onboarding new members. You can also an exclusive coupon for your affiliates to distribute to their audience and refer them back to your site.
8. Invest in email marketing
Despite new forms of digital marketing emerging every day, email marketing is still one of the most effective marketing strategies. According to Statista, 3.9 billion people send and receive emails every day. If you are looking for a great ROI on your marketing spend, you better get started on email marketing now!
Make use of lead magnets to get as many users for your mailing list. Some of the types of emails you can send out for your holiday marketing campaign include:
Promotional emails
Welcoming emails
Weekly newsletters
Special offer emails
Curated content emails
Abandoned cart emails
Abandoned cart emails
Get Started Today
When it comes to festive season promotions, timing is important. You want to make sure that your marketing campaigns will be great for Christmas. You want to push out your campaigns at the right time so you can give your learners what they need when they need it. Customizing the theme of your campaign so that it fits the needs of your learners and shows a glimpse of the holiday season is crucial.
Are you ready to get started on festive season promotions? Discover how to create a marketing plan so that you can attract your ideal client and be profitable and sleep well. Reach out to us today!
